ASHEVILLE – Vadim Bora was not only skilled at sketching people. The late artist was skilled at seeing them — inside and out.

“He really captures the essence of a person,” said Constance Richards Bora, Vadim’s widow, a longtime arts writer and director of the Grand Bohemian Gallery in Biltmore Village.

“He exaggerates a feature or features, but rather than just ‘looking’ similar it ‘feels’ like the person. He may pick up on what even that person does not know is their characteristic that truly makes them, them.”

These caricatures and other amusing observations of life in sketches, drawings, paintings and sculpture, will be highlighted in two Asheville exhibits this month.

April would have marked the 60th birthday of Bora, who died in 2011. Arriving in the U.S. in 1993 from the Caucasus Mountains, Bora established his studio and gallery in downtown Asheville in 1998.

There he mounted an annual or sometimes biannual “April Fool” exhibition, which celebrated his sharp wit and political satire, Richards Bora said. She is reviving the tradition at 5 Walnut Gallery as well as the artist’s former studio overlooking Battery Park Avenue — now the studio/gallery of Jim Dalton, a friend and student of Vadim’s.

Bora began the April Fool Show around 2000, Richards Bora said.

“It was an annual or sometimes every-other-year show, and it allowed his great and clever humor to really shine,” she said. “The themes he explored ranged from pure caricature to folkloric absurdities, his Clown Series — which often portrayed the clown character as the smartest person in the room — illustrative wordplay or concepts, amusing observations of everyday life and satirical cartoons.”

His formative years were during the oppressive and stagnant Brezhnev years of the Soviet Union, Richards Bora noted, “where often the artist’s only outlet of protest or illustrating the absurdities of the regime was through satire.”

“In addition to his sculpture, ornamental design and painting, he created illustrations — sometimes political cartoons — for newspapers and magazines of his area,” she added. “All of the above are clever observations about life and typically access a deeper, universal meaning.”

Bora was a multidisciplinary artist, whose sculptures are on display in municipal collections and museums in Kansas City, Mo.; Atlanta; Smyrna Beach, Fla.; Spartanburg, S.C.; and Moscow and Vladikavkaz, Russia; as well as in private collections around the world.

Bora’s sculptural work can be found around Asheville. He created the crucifix at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church off Charlotte Street, the trio of cats slinking down Wall Street as part of the Asheville Urban Trail and the bronze Cornelia Vanderbilt playing with her dog, Cedric, at the Biltmore Estate’s Antler Hill Village.

Bora was also a prolific painter, historical ornamentation and jewelry designer and teacher. This is the third exhibition since Bora’s passing.

A small selection of drawings will be available for purchase for the first time since Bora’s death, Richards Bora said. A portion of the proceeds will go to the Vadim Bora Fine Art Scholarship at Asheville-Buncombe Technical Community College, which was created in 2013 to honor the artist and his life’s work as a mentor and teacher to students of art, she said.

IF YOU GOVadim Bora’s work will appear in two art spaces this month:• “The April Fool Show — Part I” is at his old studio at 30 Battery Park Ave. The opening reception is 5-9 p.m. Friday. “Part 1” will focus on the Clown Series, portrait caricatures (paintings), drawings and sculpture.• “The April Fool Show — Part II” is at 5 Walnut Gallery. The opening reception is 5-8 p.m. April 9, Bora’s birthday. The show at 5 Walnut will feature the large satirical cartoons in brush and ink.• Both exhibits run April 1-30. The studio space will be open Saturdays and Sundays in April, and by appointment. 5 Walnut will be open during its regular hours.